Interpersonal relationships are hard for people like you and I sweet Sarah. We feel things deeply and the intensity of our feelings are usually too much in the moment for us to “handle” until we are taught some skills. It has taken me quite a few years of therapy (DBT) and lots of practice to slow these knee jerk reactions down.
All of this is true. Becoming aware and being able to reflect back on our behavior to say, “oh… did my reaction fit the situation?” Is a skill… over time that space between the situation and the reaction or lack there of starts to move together and then past each other. Eventually you will be in a place where you can say to yourself " I am entering a conversation with my dad that is going to potentially be triggering…" and prepare yourself mentally for it so that those big emotions don’t come up.
You are doing a super job, don’t forget you are extra hormonal right now so have a little compassion for yourself.
I started a DBT thread ( slacked last week or so) but you should hop on it and see what we are doing.